93 - Hara's Secret

Hara sat in the back of the throne room and looked out over the space. Three quarters of the zardukar were working hard to maintain Lainz all up and down the canyon. The young men in the group didn’t stand out, especially behind the veils, even with the men’s sarband. The bees hummed and settled on various of the zardukar. The wax models of the city and of the canyon grow terraces glowed with the changes they sealed into place. 

The main city of Lainz alone shone on the map. The whole rest of the continent seemed dark compared to the bright spot of the city. As the zardukar came online to hide the major concentration of human beings on the continent Lainz was slowly… slowly lost in the wash of light of ‘natural’ light sources up and down the whole length of the canyon. The Milari were included and the sparks of glowing deception spread all the way into Nadumon and down to Trovi. 

The mist curtains actually blew water into and across the zardukar, as the rain-winds heralded the arrival of the second rainy season in the year. This time... after the death of the old Radiance and the taking up of a new Queen, there was no fancy posturing of Hive Lords and their supporters and no precious daughters being trotted out to dance with prospective suitors. The whole social season had been disrupted with the massive changes. 

The lin was in every household and the poorer quarters were sending their children down to gather fibres in the canyon to sell. People kept sheet after sheet and a whole new industry had sprung up to bind sheets into bundles and boxes, carefully labelled. Everyone, if they had water and fibre, had access to a permanent record of what they wrote and they could send it across the Empire and now into Milar. 

As many copies as people wanted to pass around to their families, to their friends, even on the street. The main news sheet were being sold for either work or coin to those who had no home for a lin to settle. The Milari pages were the most popular exotic news... and Trovi, now not just a name, but a presence in people's lives every day. People put everything into the lin. 

The data keepers in the Hive were swamped with people sending and storing information, stories, pictures, drawings, recipes, ideas, machine plans, work engagements, games and how to play them. How to clean things, how to filter things, how to tend someone lost in the code. The Dark Monks found that they suddenly had a way to teach people how to retrieve relatives lost in their own heads, manuals for code work. 

The mist-curtains that played moving pictures were enormously popular, but there was no way for everyone to keep the plays yet and people were clamouring for the 'everyday' motion keeper. Learning was spreading as if the old Radiance had opened the school and poured it like fire-starter into a bonfire. 

Hara quietly gathered up her veils around her, taking more time at it than a Lainz woman, so she didn't draw any attention to herself by knocking something over with a trailing hem. Her slippers were almost silent against the stone as she walked down inside the column of the city, down into the raw rock itself. 

Shashi and Kurazon and the women --the other zardukar, female or male -- were all working as hard as they could, just to keep the city going, and to keep Prime's spy-eyes in the sky from even considering that the glitter they saw on the planet below was anything but natural. The boys were all off... and safe... she'd made certain sure of that, first thing after the concussions. They weren't playing war anymore. Prime had done really well by them, by raining destruction from the sky on the Nadumon. 

If she knew her father... and step father, truly... then Prime'd near as shoved them all into the same bed and he'd have to just choke on the consequences of married cultures. There was the Terence code on the moon but she found that just too tempting to flee there and chat and waste time, and just be with something that wasn't even a human boy, but a machine ghost of one, though she did wonder if he was as charming in the flesh as his simulacra was. 

She was far below the usual paths for the city, far below the spiralling paths and rooms and evacuation halls for the populous, should an attack from the sky ever come. Far below the vast reservoirs where the filtered water was kept for emergency. 

Her bees buzzed around her head and she smiled as they landed on her sarband and told her about what they'd built, what they'd made, what they'd helped people design. She had clouds of all of the building bees around her and they buzzed louder and louder as they realized she was heading down to her place. 

It was a hollow space, with bee-built corbels holding up the tons of city above. There were slits to let light in all around and at this point the butte was connected hard to the cliff, a bit over half way down to the canyon floor. There was enough rock, now edged with bee metal, to hold this space,this studio, for her. She hadn't shown anyone else human what she was doing here.

There was only a human sized door, since she had not yet come up with anything that needed a larger access door. She keyed the door and that triggered the bioluminescent lights in the walls and ceiling, illuminating her project. 

The boys had said, 'find a way to fly'. But her talks with Terence/machine had convinced her that it wasn't enough to merely get word out to the greater community off planet, that Milar (and Lainz and the others, she reminded herself) existed and owned the part of the planet they were on. Prime had showed he was perfectly capable of trying to erase people on the ground. He probably had a dozen lies ready if someone should ever come from away, and ask him about it. They were sitting targets, even if mostly hidden. 

No, the flying thing they built had to have multiple roles... and one of them was a sword and shield for people. A thing that flew, as if warbirds could fly, and could stop Prime's rocks from hitting the ground... or even breaking up in the atmosphere because Terry's machine had illustrated for her how awful that could be as well.

In the centre of her secret hall, was her best bee-built design for a flying machine that might be the Shield for Milar and Lainz. She'd think of flying swords later. 

This was a mechanical bush dragon that could swat small rocks and snowballs out of their courses, break them up, deflect them. If she could find a way to power it, it should be able to get into the air... might keep the city safe, while they argued with Prime in the greater courts.

92 - Why Do They Call You...AIEEEE

Terry sat in the pilot's chair, staring at the screen, his chin propped on his hand with one finger pointing up past his ear. He tried hard not to sulk. Sulking was uncouth. The fact that the 'rescued' spy from the other land, Eshmaeel, didn't trust him and had only told the machine which direction his home was... AND the fact that that machine hadn't seen fit to tell him anything about it, had effectively poked holes in any kind of self importance he may have started with.

"I'm a Tech Second Class,” he muttered, watching the tunnel melt away in front of Mom. “I worked on the moon, had intergalactic friends, even code of my very own hooked into the galactic hub that Prime doesn't know anything about.” He shifted over to his other side, resolutely keeping his back to Eshmaeel, who sat cross-legged in the bunk, clutching the briefcase full of dangerous information to his chest. “It was my brother who set all this up to get these two ungrateful boys home and me out of danger.” 

Mom clicked as if she had just been activated by an address of his. “So it was. Your brother Gerald as the owner of this vehicle, accepts all liability, should this unauthorized usage ever be disclosed or discovered at all."

"You two have just taken over our great escape and left me to trail along like the comic relief in a radio drama.”

"Terence.” The machine actually paused. “Such attitude is unseemly and inappropriate. You cannot be the entertainment hero who comes in with cape flaring and blasters blazing to save the day. It is your lives that you are talking about, not face or status.” 

He straightened, about to verbally excoriate the machine for presuming to lecture him... and in Gerald's terms no less! He must have programmed the damn thing. Then what it had said sank in and he subsided. “Cape flaring? I'll have you know that capes are both foolish and dangerous, even in the animated worlds.” 

There was a static-like buzz for a fraction of a second. “Very astute, Terry.”

"Did Gerald program you?” Another pause, long enough for the human to wonder if the program had crashed.

“He did... but he came down all the time to talk to me.”

Terry stared at the console as if he would stare into an opponent's eyes. “He talked to you?”

"For hours sometimes, when he couldn't sleep.” Terry had the image of his brother, riding over foggy meadows on his quisling horse, to the one entity who would, or could listen to him as he unburdened his heart. His wife... was a good Xanadu woman who would have just fainted at the idea her husband would have problems, much less worries or heartaches. I want friends I can talk to, he thought. Not just a warm sex object for my bedroom that happened to produce children. But I'm not attracted to anyone my own sex. It was the first time he'd truly felt how lonely he was, understood how lonely Gerald must be. He'd begun the process on the moon, but it hadn't truly sunk in until now. He cleared his throat, that had somehow gotten full of phlegm. "How long till our breakout?”

"Fifteen minutes.”

"Thank you, Mom.

"You are welcome, Terry.” They emerged in a jumble of rocks on the edge of the terraforming. Smooth green fields ran straight into razor sharp tsingy that had not yet been broken down to be infected with Terran biomass and safely covered up. "I suggest that you hold the controller as we begin your transportation at speed,” Mom said. “That way you will learn how to drive this vehicle faster, without my assistance.”

“Assistance.” His tone was sour. The vehicle had no external lights, not even running lights and was still moving forward at the same steady speed as a robotic horse. He picked up the controller and found that the haptics let him feel what the vehicle was doing as it kept the cabin rock steady while the rest of it scrambled and squeezed and clambered through the tsingy.

“Of course, Terry. You are the pilot.” In the moonlight outside, enhanced by the windscreen, he could see that the tsingy on the edges just got worse and worse. There were no places for a road. There were no places for a machine this big to squeeze through. 

There was only spines and spines and spines of vertical rock stretching as far as he could see. The machine spiralled up to the top of one like a silverfish on a wall and paused. “It looks impossible,” he said quietly. “Can you get us out?”

“Yes. I am retracting my sand-crawler legs.” Mom showed him the front two legs that looked rather like shovels with toes, pulling up under her windscreen. “Cabin medical restraints at full.” 

A squawk came from the bunks as Eshmaeel found himself safely lying down. The controller in Terry's hand quivered and then was quiet. “All right, if you say you can get us through.” His hand tilted forward as he said “You've been very smooth... why in Prime's name do people call you a sand-flEEE EEEE EEEE EE!”

91 - Wait at the Wadi

Dag drew another veil out of the bag behind her saddle and sighed in relief as it cut down the relentless dust.The relief flock had loaded up and headed up, out of the shelter of the canyon, onto the flatlands, heading for Nadumon around the lake. 

The winds howled day and night,and the fall winds from the south were starting up, loaded with water. Silly's eyes were all but closed and his feathers were fluffed. He kept up a non-stop flow of cheeping complaint, but almost never refused what she asked of him. The silk band hung sodden from his beak and every one of his hair-feathers was coated with dirt. 

Dag coughed and managed to clear her nose and eyes by running her hand up under the new veil. There was so much mud in the air it was hard to breathe. The wind had never truly ceased since the air-strike and the last lin message from his Radiance had said they would bring the survivors down to the dry river. If they didn't get to the meeting point soon, the river wouldn't be dry any longer. The autumn rains would start with punishing force. They had to get everyone back before the rain began pounding down, floods in every one of the karst cavern-towns as the water moved from the south, back up to the north poles. 

It was the second time of year that Lainz had its chance to catch and keep water. In reservoirs, in basins, in caverns and caves and sips and rivers, behind bee-built dams and sluice gates. But when the weather changed it was crazy to be out in it. She hoped they could get the Nadu back to the main canyon before the rains started. 

She reached ahead, in code, searching, feeling other zardukar struggling to connect with the Lainz featherspitters so far ahead of them.  

*Bee connections established. Queen larva mother queen. Brooder, worker. Support. Radiance... exhausted... Milar tiger giving.*

*Kyrus? Is that you in this code? Kyrus?*

*No, Nasera... Ilax... Ilax here.* His code connection was thin and shaky as if he were working on the ragged edge of his energy.

*How far away are you? We are at Otvee Arstah Wadi.*

*Two days north of there. Coming fast. Wait there.* 

Dag reached to shake the silk in Silly's beak. “Come on, bird of mine. We need to catch up with Director Raghnall. Raghnall,” she repeated as Silly tried to shake the damp dirt off by fluffing and stretched his neck to run. 

“RAWWW,” was the noise he made.

90 - As Long As It's Eatable

Eshmaeel struggled to open his eyes and finally, finally made them open. He'd been hearing voices after he drank what the labmaster had given him, but could not be sure of their reality. He found himself lying in a padded box with one open side and the labmaster's brother standing there looking at him. There was a steady vibration under his back and when he tried to move he found his hands and feet were still somehow attached to the padding. At least they wouldn't move for him. He was out of the endarkened cage but he was not free. He turned his head away from the Xanadu man, closed his eyes and called “Davood!” There was no answer. “If you've killed my brother, I'll cut your throat,” he said quietly. “Or rip it out with my teeth if I have to.”

There was a gasp. Honestly, how could a man grown not understand simple things like revenge? “I've not killed anybody! He's unconscious so he doesn't attack me or get in the way once he realizes I'm taking him away from his artificially precious Prime!” Eshmaeel snapped his head around fast enough that one of the small muscles in his neck hurt. “Taking HIM away from Prime? Taking us away from Prime?”

The man had a sour look on his face as he answered. “I am reliably informed that I am doing nothing but being rescued from Prime myself, though I am certain my brother never thought I would not be the primary driver of this little expedition.”

“You aren't? I mean you're being taken away too? And me, then.” His eyes darted around, looking for the person rescuing them. The Xanadu... or ex-Xanadu man, if he was to be believed... raised his voice.

“Mom, would you be so kind as to introduce yourself to ... Ishmael? Is that it?”

“Eshmaeel,” he snapped, even as a mellow woman's voice said,

“Hello, young man. I am the M.O.M.M.1 currently in driving control of this vehicle, under advisement of Terence Arthur Cameron. I shall be endeavouring to take this emergency vehicle past the perimeter of Xanadu code-space, where Terence will be able to access his own code. Are you comfortable? Are you hungry? Thirsty?”

“Um...he called you Mom. Isn't that the Xanadu word for mother?”

“In my case, it is a name.”

“All right. I'm lying down and nothing hurts if that's what you're asking, though I need to... um... relieve myself.” His bladder was uncomfortably full.

“I could engage the injured protocols --” Terry cut in. “-- it means that if you mess yourself the machine will clean up but it's not terribly comfortable.”

“Terence,being biological like you, must perforce be correct about the comfort level.”

“Um...if I promise not to try and kill you, is there a place I can...”

“Yes!” He indicated a suddenly lit outline of a door at the back of the... Mom?

“I swear I will not try to kill you. Mom, I couldn't take you over if I wanted to, could I?” It didn't seem likely. What would the old man do? He had no name for the spymaster. Wasn't even sure he was a he or that he was old, but it was what he'd seen. Stay calm, keep asking questions. 

“No, you could not. I shall be waking your brother after you, to do similar ablutions. He needs to eliminate as well, even in half-stasis as he is.” Eshmaeel eased himself out of the box bed and over to the outlined door.

“I'll just use this quickly then.”

“Should you need instruction, just ask. I shall reply privately.”

“Thank you.”

Terence even looked relieved. “That would be far too much information for my taste. After your brother is seen to, can we talk?”

“I have nothing to do but talk,Xanadu man.”

“Not a Xanadu citizen anymore. My brother has made it look like I died in the horrid laboratory fire he just set. It's Terry.”

Eshmaeel just nodded. The facilities were so tiny the door actually touched him after he closed it, but he'd learned to use their fancy built up holes while he was in the cage. Having water to clean his hands with afterwards was still nerve wracking, even if he wasn't thirsty. Mom got Davood up, like a sleepwalker, she said. He couldn't help but think of the vehicle's driver brain as female. She sounded female. “We can't keep him like that forever,” he said after they'd gotten Davood lying down again.

“No, but I'm hoping that your coders, your programmers, will be able to undo what Gerald's people did to him.”

“I'm not just going to tell you where we are!”

“I'm asking you, please tell me, so we can all go there.”

“I can't trust you!” He found himself pressed against the closed door of the cloaca. He couldn't see any other doors and the window in the front showed a glittery tunnel. “How do I know this isn't just another hallucination you're making me have so I tell you where I'm from?”

Terry sighed, ran a hand through his hair. “Point. But isn't this a little elaborate a ruse just to get that information that Gerald... oh. Wait... Gerald will have gotten that information from your brother just by asking. It'll be in this bag...” He looked down at a rigid leather bag. Then he pushed it toward Eshmaeel. “Here. The only surviving copy of what your brother told my brother, or his people. Look. I don't care where your people are, I'm just hoping that bringing you two back will land me a place there... for a while, I guess. As a guest, not an enemy.” He shrugged. “After we're out of the tunnel and off Xanadu, why don't you talk to Mom in the loo....” he jerked a thumb at the cloaca door, indicating the only private spot in the machine when Eshmaeel obviously didn't understand. “In there... and tell her where to go. You don't need to tell me anything.”

Eshmaeel picked up the bag and tucked it under his arm.“I'll do that. Somebody asked if I were hungry or thirsty? I'm starving.” 

“Hmmm, so am I. Though printed food isn't my favourite.” 

What is he babbling about? Printed food? I don't care, as long as its eatable.

89 - You Needn't Add My Name

The wall glowed brightly and evaporated into golden sparks that grew brighter and brighter and Terry threw up a hand abruptly before the screen polarized. “Ow.” 

 “My screen reactivity is recalibrated. Apologies from the company for your discomfort. Tunnel depth now forty metres.”

The golden wash receded from the machine with the speed of a bicycle rickshaw, it looked like, glittering. “Won't the sensors above catch this?” Terry asked the machine as if it were Station, used to addressing a disembodied voice. 

“Negative.Current surface temperature varies from 1600 degrees C down to 500 degrees C. All emergency crews are here.” A small screen came to life on the dashboard, showing what looked like a target. “The central red circle indicates the remains of the building and all flaming debris. The outer circle is the limit of the fire-fighting machines and where they are maintaining their perimeter.” A dotted line from the centre directly out toward the edge of the continent began to strobe. “The digging machinery is calibrated for twenty kilometres before I shall be required to surface.” 

“Twenty...kilometres.”

“Yes. Engaging drive.” The squeezed-together, wrinkled machine rose up on its legs and flattened itself out, stretching smoothly into the tunnel. Terry wasn't sure why the manual was so adamant about staying in the crash couches. He could barely feel that they were moving. 

“Can you give me a rear-view?” He asked. 

“Affirmative.” A third screen activated, below the main screen. The glow from the tunnel being formed in front cast wildly black shadows behind the Mark VIII but gave him enough light to see what was going on. As they oozed out of the tiny space carved out for the sand-flea, the rock was coalescing, growing into and filling the space with what looked like natural rock.

“How should I... um... talk to you, machine? Do you have a designation?”

“I am Medical Over-Ride Module Mark I.” 

Terry blinked. “M.O.M.M.I? I simply cannot call you 'mommy'.” 

The machine voice never varied in timbre or speed but somehow managed to convey complete disapproval. “Mom will be an acceptable short form.”

Terry sighed. “A RAMTUFF evacuation vehicle with a nanny. Just what I need.” Apparently it did not have the nuanced human detection mode engaged.

“Yes. Exactly correct. At current speeds we shall be emerging from under the ground in two hours. On emergence at midnight I am instructed to await your direction. When I have been informed of the appropriate destination, my progress will be considerably faster than our current crawl.”

“Destination...I guess I should wake up my guide and convince him I'm getting him and his brother out of here.”

“Correction,Terence Arthur Cameron, this machine is getting all of you out of Xanadu code space.”

“Yes, Mom.” He couldn't help rolling his eyes. 

“My cabin sensors detected an additional facial twitch. Inexperienced driver subroutine. Engaging sarcasm and irony detection modes.”

“Just call me Terry, all right?”

“As you command, Terry.”

He pressed his lips together, not answering, and tried to rise from the couch a second time. This time there was no impediment and the cabin, now that Mom was underway was large enough that he could stand straight without smacking his head, though his top-hat would have been too much. The bunks were now full size and he went to the one holding the older, unloyalized boy. “Mom. Would you be able to restrain this boy, should he become violent towards me?”

“Yes,Terry.” 

“Please restrain him, as a precaution, and then over-ride the stasis he's been fed.”

“As you command, Terry.”

“Thank you, Mom. You needn't add my name to every utterance.” 

“You are welcome, Terence. Understood.”

88 - Medical Over-ride Module

The booming, and clattering, things rattling down outside all around the sand-flea had gone on for hours, perhaps days, he’d wound his watch three times.  It had chimed, as usual, for winding but without outside input, it didn’t feel like twelve hours.

The unconscious boys were all right, held almost in stasis, and he’d have to wake the one still ‘unloyalized’ and convince him that they were getting out, but the catastrophe that Gerald had started must have been truly epic in its scope.  There was still the occasional, though smaller, muffled explosion from above, sending dust and bits and pebbles showering down on the flea, rattling.  The electricity in the space was shut off so there were no vacuums or scrubbers to clear the film and debris away.

Full bathroom facilities are available in each couch, in case of emergency evacuation mode being engaged.  For longer term cleansing, and in water-poor areas, the Mark VIII has a cleansing booth, with one-button function.  PLEASE DO NOT LEAVE THE BOOTH UNTIL THE GREEN LIGHT COMES ON.  Should the cleansing nano-machines be released into the main cabin, the Mark VIII is designed to lock down the main cabin until all safety protocols are concluded and the cleaners are shut down.

All passengers are advised to stay in the crash-cushioned couches while the machine is in motion. Also, passengers are advised not to raise their heads out of the form-molded head rest. RAMTUFF will not be held responsible for whiplash and concussive injuries should passengers ignore safety warnings and protocols.

Should the driver be injured, incapacitated or be a new driver unfamiliar to the machine, the Medical Over-ride Module will engage to assist.

Terry lay back in the chair, the cushioning already conformed to his head, the book on his chest, snoring slightly, his hat tilted down askew across his face.  It was the silence that woke him.  Things had stopped happening for long enough above, that there were no more massive explosions and things quit pinging off the hide of the Mark VIII.

He grunted awake as a click heralded something new happening and was blinking stupidly at the console when his brother’s voice came on. “Heya, Terry, new info.  You’re leaving early.  Prime’s going to be all over the lab the instant the flames die down enough to let them close.  The firefighters are all out, the perimeter is being hosed down and I am wringing my hands in abject horror that my little brother was apparently hoping to raise his tech level by doing research in MY laboratory facilities.  There are extremely damaged security videos showing you entering the library approximately two hours before the failure of the power plant.  I fear I shall discover that my innocent little brother was caught in a horrible accident.  Boo hoo.”

“You bastard!”

“Don’t try and interrupt me, Ter, I cannot hear you.  I will, however, leave pauses for you to appropriately curse me.  This channel is only one way. I’m cheating dreadfully, I know.  So sorry. Once this channel closes, a tunnel will be opened that will bypass the perimeter and all material will cheerfully be used to backfill the hole you are currently sitting in, even with striations in the material that will echo the rock strata, even should Prime suspect and send nanosensors down.  There will be no hole, no sign there ever was a hole or a tunnel or any such thing.”

“Drive your conveyance out the tunnel, it is smart enough to engage the appropriate mode if you push the forward button on the controller.  I’m assuming you’ve already unhooked the controller and had it conform to your hands.  Okay… I’ll wait…”

“Oh, sod you, big brother.  I already have it.”  Terry snarled at the console.  The controller in question was the one Gerald had thrust into his hand right at the start.

“So now that you’ve cursed me out… you’ve got the steering toggle set up for your thumb.  Good luck, and… Terence… I’m so glad that there is a place for you to get out to.  I am just as happy not to have packed the family away and headed out blindly into the sand.  I was on the verge of it, but now that I know there’s a ‘somewhere else’ I’ll send you out and I do expect you to get in touch with me once you find it.  I’m certain that if things continue to go sour here, we’ll want to follow you.  Bon chance, bro.”

As the voice channel clicked to shut down, the screen showed the wall in front of the sand-flea beginning to glow around the edges.

Terence tried to sit up abruptly but was restrained by his couch. “Please relax,” the machine’s voice said.  “New driver detected. M.O.M engaged.  Please wait as egress tunnel is complete.  We will be travelling shortly.  If you press the forward toggle too soon, I shall wait until the way is clear, do not be alarmed that I do not begin to move immediately.”

Canada Day

Today is Canada Day and I shall not be posting... other than this notice.  Right now I am working with SK to write her character in... I'm having some weird ideas for that Kitsune... we'll see.  I mean Rin fell down a badger hole.

I am also talking to another fan supporter, Dennis Poor, who I am hoping to do a tuckerization for.  He has bought artwork and supported me everywhere, so if I can come up a good character or can modify one already extant for him... then good.

I started another painting today 'Tiger in the Leaves'  It is two feet by three  feet, (for all those still measuring in Imperial).  I'll post it on deviantart and here when its done.  Hmmm maybe I should do an 'in progress'?  Let me know.